Ancient World Review

St. Victoria's "Incorruptible" Body

"If you’re looking for macabre attractions, there is no place quite like Rome, thanks to the Catholic tradition of preserving and displaying relics of canonized saints for all the world to see. And there is no place in Rome quite as marvelous as the Santa Maria della Vittoria for that reason." Source: Atlas Obscura.

"While relics are often just parts of saints, this beautiful baroque church displays the full corpse of an 'incorruptible saint' in a glass case you can walk right up to to view — a rarity in Rome. This is the preserved corpse of the beautiful Saint Victoria."

Comment: I don't know where to start. First of all, this isn't a miraculously preserved corpse but a wax figure containing a (partial?) human skeleton decked out with a dress and someone else's hair. Second, there's no telling whose skeleton this is. Phony relics aren't exactly unheard of in the church, so the skeleton could be the remains of a common street prostitute or a pagan witch for all we know. Third, the Catholic fascination with displaying body parts and the "incorruptible" bodies of saints is grotesque and morbid. Fourth, the only reason that Victoria is a saint is because she stubbornly refused to marry a pagan and was eventually executed for being a Christian:

"Their legend recounts that, in the time of the Emperor Decius, Anatolia and Victoria were sisters whose marriage was arranged to two noble, non-Christian Roman men. They resisted matrimony and their prospective grooms denounced them as Christians. They received permission to imprison the women on their estates and convince them to renounce their faith. Anatolia's suitor, Titus Aurelius, gave up, and handed her back to the authorities. Victoria’s suitor, Eugenius, was more persistent, but also ended up returning her to the authorities." (Wikipedia)

This is a bizarre story, but it's possible that Victoria was executed for being a Christian since some persecutions did happen under the reign of the obscure Decius. According to Wikipedia, "During his reign, he attempted to strengthen the Roman state and its religion, leading to the Decian persecution, where a number of prominent Christians (including Pope Fabian) were put to death." (Wikipedia)

If Victoria and her sister existed and were actually executed, they were ultimately killed because they must have refused to perform a sacrifice to the Roman gods and the well-being of the emperor according to the edict of Decius. This was the standard Roman loyalty test. The polytheistic Romans didn't care what you believed in as such. They just wanted to make sure you weren't a threat to the state and traditional Roman values.

Rebuilding Notre Dame Cathedral Will Be "Incredibly Hard"

Report from Nov. 27, 2020.

"Putting out the inferno that tore through the roof of Notre Dame in April 2019 was only the beginning of saving the iconic cathedral." Source: Live Science.

"From the precarious spaghetti of burnt scaffolding hanging over the building to the potential for the walls to collapse on themselves, architects and conservation experts had — and still have — a daunting task in front of them. A new special from NOVA, the science series on PBS, takes viewers through the challenges. It's a journey that travels from within the cathedral itself, to the catacombs below Paris, to the forests of Normandy that might provide the wood to reconstruct the building's massive roof."

Comment: We'll probably never know what caused the Notre Dame fire. As far as I can tell, the investigation went nowhere. The French government announced (while the fire was still burning) that there was no evidence of arson, but the timing of that announcement made it kind of suspect, to say the least. Earlier this year, the fire investigators said that the fire may have been caused by an electrical problem or a carelessly dropped cigarette, but that was just speculation. If they had any concrete evidence of negligence they would have sued the contractors that were doing the renovation, but the only lawsuits I've read about involved the lead contamination caused by the fire. The investigators seem to have decided early on that the fire was accidental. According to France 24 (April 18,2019), they questioned around 40 people - cathedral staff and restoration workers -- and UPI reported on June 27, 2019, that a judicial inquiry had interviewed more than 100 people -- but if these interviews produced any actual evidence I haven't been able to track it down.

Video from April 18, 2019. It doesn't sound very likely that an electrical problem with the elevator could have caused the fire and I'd be amazed to learn that a dropped cigarette could have started a blaze like this.

Maybe the fire was an accident. Maybe not. If it was an accident, then somebody was extremely negligent. The cathedral was in bad shape, its spire rotted in several places, and the fire danger was well understood. According to Wikipedia, "Extensive attention had been given to the risk of fire at the cathedral. The Paris Fire Brigade drilled regularly to prepare for emergencies there, including on-site exercises in 2018; a firefighter was posted to the cathedral each day; and fire wardens checked conditions beneath the roof [where the fire started] three times daily." The cathedral had fire alarms as well, but when the first one went off it took around twenty minutes for staff to actually locate the fire. Presumably it was already out of control by that time.

The thing that bothers me the most about this disaster is the way that the authorities seem to have decided early on that the fire was accidental. How could they say that when there was no evidence? Technically, it's true that there is no evidence of arson, but it's also true that there is no evidence that it was an accident. All of these statements about the cause of the fire are meaningless because there's no evidence one way or another. The fact that the authorities and the media went out of their way to "debunk" the speculation that this could have been arson just shows how nervous they are about the explosive situation they've created in France with their insane immigration policies.

The Trinity Is Pagan

Comment: I don't believe in God myself, so the nature of the god I don't believe in has always been more or less irrelevant. Now that I think about it, though, this three-faced Christian deity seems to be completely pagan.

The Christian god has three aspects or personalities, just like the pagan gods had different manifestations. Take Zeus, for instance. Zeus Olympios was the king of the gods, Zeus Georgos the god of crops and harvests in Athens, Zeus Tallaios a solar deity worshiped in Crete, and so on.

Another example of a polymorphous deity would be the Hindu god Brahma, usually pictured as having four faces signifying different aspects of his underlying nature. (Image: Probably Nurpur, Punjab Hills, Northern India [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.)

As it turns out, the Christian god we're all so familiar with has deeper pagan roots than I would have thought.

The concept of the Trinity as such isn't found in the Bible, apparently, but there are references to "the Father, Son and Holy Ghost." The idea of a three-in-one god was basically invented by the church, which borrowed heavily from pagan philosophy when it came up with the doctrine. According to Wikipedia, "[t]he doctrine of the trinity . . . is not a product of the earliest Christian period, and we do not find it carefully expressed before the end of the second century."

The Trinity doctrine was influenced by Greek metaphysical philosophy and created a split in the early church:

"Such metaphysical thinking was common among the intelligentsia of the Greek world and carried over into the thinking of the Roman world of the New Testament period and succeeding centuries." Source: United Church of God. The so-called "true" church "resisted such infiltration" and "... [t]wo distinct threads of Christianity split and developed separately—one true to the plain and simple teachings of the Bible and the other increasingly compromised with pagan thought and practices adopted from the Greco-Roman world."

Apparently the doctrine of the Trinity wasn't formally accepted until the fourth century when Christianity became the official state religion of what was left of the Roman empire:

"Nontrinitarianism (or antitrinitarianism) refers to Christian belief systems that reject the doctrine of the Trinity as found in the Nicene Creed as not having a scriptural origin. Nontrinitarian views differ widely on the nature of God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit. Various nontrinitarian views, such as Adoptionism, Monarchianism, and Arianism existed prior to the formal definition of the Trinity doctrine in AD 325, 360, and 431, at the Councils of Nicaea, Constantinople, and Ephesus, respectively. Following the final victory of orthodoxy at Constantinople in 381, Arianism was driven from the Empire, retaining a foothold amongst the Teutonic tribes. When the Franks converted to Catholicism in 496, however, it gradually faded out. Nontrinitarianism was later renewed in the Gnosticism of the Cathars in the 11th through 13th centuries, in the Age of Enlightenment of the 18th century, and in some groups arising during the Second Great Awakening of the 19th century." (Wikipedia)

It's ironic that some of the so-called heretical Christian movements, at least in this one aspect, were more scripturally "pure" than the official church.

Vaguely related: Duterte calls trinity doctrine "silly."

The Malleus Maleficarum

"The Malleus Maleficarum (Latin for 'The Hammer of Witches', or 'Hexenhammer' in German) is one of the most famous medieval treatises on witches. It was written in 1486 by Heinrich Kramer and Jacob Sprenger, and was first published in Germany in 1487. Its main purpose was to challenge all arguments against the existence of witchcraft and to instruct magistrates on how to identify, interrogate and convict witches." Source: The Malleus Maleficarum.

"Some modern scholars believe that Jacob Sprenger contributed little if anything to the work besides his name, but the evidence to support this is weak. Both men were members of the Dominican Order and Inquisitors for the Catholic Church. They submitted the Malleus Maleficarum to the University of Cologne’s Faculty of Theology on May 9, 1487, seeking its endorsement."

According to some sources I've seen, the Malleus Maleficarum was banned by the church, but apparently this wasn't the case:

"While general consensus is that The Catholic Church banned the book in 1490 by placing it on the Index Librorum Prohibitorum ('List of Prohibited Books'), the first Index was, in fact, produced in 1559 under the direction of Pope Paul IV. Therefore such claims are dubious, at best." (Ibid)

According to Wikipedia, "The Malleus recommended not only torture but also deception in order to obtain confessions: 'And when the implements of torture have been prepared, the judge, both in person and through other good men zealous in the faith, tries to persuade the prisoner to confess the truth freely; but, if he will not confess, he bid attendants make the prisoner fast to the strappado [see note below] or some other implement of torture. The attendants obey forthwith, yet with feigned agitation. Then, at the prayer of some of those present, the prisoner is loosed again and is taken aside and once more persuaded to confess, being led to believe that he will in that case not be put to death."

Note: Weirdly enough, the strappado (modified to prevent dislocations) has become a popular form of sexual bondage. There are lots of videos of the practice out there in case you're interested.

Comment: The Malleus Maleficarum has been called one of the most evil books of all time, but I'd love to have a copy of one of the early editions. These old books are beautiful and they're worth a fair amount of money.

Video from Jan. 2020.

The Malleus Maleficarum is obsolete, of course. These days we don't need a manual on how to identify witches, force them to confess and then execute them because modern witches freely confess their blasphemies on the internet and most of them aren't worth hanging. Not for witchcraft, anyway. I can think of other reasons to string them up, however.

Mary, The Christian Demi-Goddess

"Mary, as the mother of Jesus, is documented in Roman catacombs: paintings from the first half of the 2nd century show her holding the Christ Child. Excavations in the crypt of St Peter's Basilica uncovered a very early fresco of Mary together with Saint Peter. The Roman Priscilla catacombs depict the oldest Marian paintings from the middle of the 2nd century: Mary is shown with Jesus on her lap; they are next to a man in a tunic, his left hand holding a book and his right hand pointing to a star over his head, the latter being an Old Testament symbol of messiahs and/or the Messiah." Source: Wikipedia.

The transformation of Mary into a Christian demi-goddess or minor deity seems to have started with the apocryphal Gospel of James, aka The Proto-Gospel or Protoevangelium of James. Thought to have been written sometime during the 2nd century AD, "It tells of the virginal conception of the Virgin Mary, her upbringing and marriage to Joseph, the journey of the holy couple to Bethlehem, the birth of Jesus, and events immediately following. It is the earliest surviving assertion of the perpetual virginity of Mary, meaning her virginity not just prior to the birth of Jesus, but during and afterwards, while defending Jesus against pagan and Jewish accusations of illegitimacy." (Wikipedia)

Jesus' miraculous birth or Immaculate Conception was a common theme in ancient mythology, but the doctrine of Mary's perpetual virginity leads to various theological difficulties for the Christians who believe in it. According to the New Testament, Jesus had four brothers: James, Joseph (Joses), Judas (Jude), and Simon. (He apparently had sisters as well, but they're not named.) If Mary was indeed a perpetual virgin, this obviously means that all of Jesus' siblings were also sons and daughters of a virgin, so there wasn't anything special about Jesus in this regard. To get around this problem, believers in Mary's perpetual virginity end up having to argue that Jesus didn't have any biological sisters and brothers at all. They all just kind of grew up together or something.

Mary is venerated by Catholics, Anglicans, Lutherans and the Eastern and Oriental Orthodox churches. According to Wikipedia, "this veneration especially takes the form of prayer for intercession with her Son, Jesus Christ." This makes Mary a kind of intermediate deity who along with the other saints and angels can intercede in God's divine council. Mary has considerable powers in her own right, however. She can perform miracles, heal the sick, etc., and when she died, God raised her body into heaven, according to Catholic and Eastern Christian teachings. In another version of this story, she never died at all but was assumed directly into heaven while still alive. The exact nature of her assumption is a matter of theological debate:

"Many Catholics believe that Mary first died before being assumed, but they believe that she was miraculously resurrected before being assumed. Others believe she was assumed bodily into Heaven without first dying. Either understanding may be legitimately held by Catholics, with Eastern Catholics observing the Feast as the Dormition." (Wikipedia)

Note: The Dormition is an Eastern festival which "commemorates the 'falling asleep' or death of Mary the Theotokos ('Mother of God', literally translated as God-bearer), and her bodily resurrection before being taken up into heaven."

There are a couple of problems here. For instance, if Mary is the "mother of God," then who got her pregnant in the first place? And if the Son and the Father are "one substance, essence or nature" did the Son in the form of the Father come down to Mary and give birth to himself? (The doctrine of the Trinity has never made any sense to me).

According to early sources, Mary was what we would now call a child bride:

"Some apocryphal accounts state that at the time of her betrothal to Joseph, Mary was 12–14 years old. According to ancient Jewish custom, Mary could have been betrothed at about 12. Hyppolitus of Thebes says that Mary lived for 11 years after the death of her son Jesus, dying in 41 AD." (Wikipedia)

^"The earliest extant biographical writing on Mary is Life of the Virgin attributed to the 7th-century saint, Maximus the Confessor, which portrays her as a key element of the early Christian Church after the death of Jesus."

The details of Mary's life are sketchy. So is the date of her death (if it actually occurred) and her resurrection. These are all details, however. The real question is whether she actually existed.

Carpenters Demonstrate Medieval Techniques During Notre Dame Cathedral Reconstruction

"PARIS (AP) — With precision and boundless energy, a team of carpenters used medieval techniques to raise up — by hand — a three-ton oak truss Saturday in front of Notre Dame Cathedral, a replica of the wooden structures that were consumed in the landmark’s devastating April 2019 fire that also toppled its spire." Source: AP (9/19/20).

"The demonstration to mark European Heritage Days gave the hundreds of people a first-hand look at the rustic methods used 800 years ago to build the triangular frames in the nave of Notre Dame de Paris."

Comment: I'm glad to see that this demonstration of medieval techniques included the use of ye olde buzz-saw and authentic safety helmets, ear protectors and plandemic face masks from the period.

Nitpicking aside, the French do seem to have decided to restore the cathedral to its original state as much as possible. That's good news. For a while there it looked like they would turn the church into some postmodern monstrosity.

Video from July 2020.

Moving right along, I have to point out -- again -- that we still don't have any real explanation for what caused the fire. The Paris prosecutor announced on the day after the fire that there was no evidence of arson. How he could have known that is anybody's guess, but it's not hard to figure out why he would say it considering all the attacks on churches which were taking place in France at the time.

Arson was ruled out immediately, before any investigation could have been conducted. The official line now is that the fire was accidental.

There was some speculation at first that the fire might have been caused by a cigarette dropped by one of the construction workers doing restoration work on the cathedral, but it didn't seem very likely that a burning cigarette could have set off a conflagration like that:

"As of September, five months after the fire, investigators thought the cause of the fire was more likely an electrical fault than a cigarette. Determining the exact place in which the fire started was expected to take a great deal more time and work. By 15 April 2020 [1], investigators believed 'the fire to have been started by either a cigarette or a short circuit in the electrical system'." (Wikipedia)

And that's that. As far as I can tell, there hasn't been any more news about the fire investigation since April of this year. I haven't run across anything in English, anyway. Aside from occasional items about the restoration work the story seems to have vanished into a black hole.

[1] Note the date: April 15, 2020. Curiously enough, ArtNet posted an article about the fire on the same date which mentioned that "experts still haven’t been able to gain access to the area where the blaze is believed to have begun." Maybe I'm missing something, but if the cathedral was still so damaged and fragile that investigators couldn't access the area where the fire apparently started, then how could they say anything about what caused it?

More Attacks On Christian Churches (Sept. 2020)

Video from Aug. 2019. These attacks have been going on for years now.

"Vatican City, Sep 8, 2020 / 06:30 am MT (CNA).- Attacks on churches in France are back to their 'normal' level following a nationwide lockdown, according to an organization led by young Catholics." (Catholic News Agency)

Note: "Since 2017, the Paris-based L’Observatoire de la Christianophobie (Observatory of Christianophobia) has recorded anti-Christian incidents in France month by month on interactive maps. The most recent map available, for August 2020, shows 11 incidents, comprising six acts of vandalism and five thefts. The Observatory recorded nine disturbances on its map for August 2019."

Video from Sept. 10, 2020.

"T. CATHARINES, Ontario, September 9, 2020 (LifeSiteNews) — A tabernacle stolen from a Canadian Catholic cathedral early Tuesday morning was found Wednesday lying in a canal — but the consecrated Hosts that had been in it were nowhere to be seen.

"Two people were caught on surveillance cameras breaking into St. Catherine of Alexandria Cathedral about 4:30 A.M. on September 8, Catholic News Agency reported."

Note: Over the years, there have been dozens of cases in Canada and the US of thieves stealing tabernacles for whatever reason. Motives seem to range from simple vandalism to host desecration, general anti-Catholic sentiment and theft for financial gain (some of these tabernacles are valuable or apparently valuable historical relics). In some cases, Satanists may have been after the consecrated wafers for ritual use:

"... a Black Mass takes the Catholic Mass and inverts it, intentionally mocking the Catholic celebration. Participants often use a consecrated Eucharistic host and desecrate it, using it in obscene ways. This is one of the reasons why tabernacles in Catholic churches have locks and why some parishes have an usher stand next to a communion line. Both policies aim at protecting the Eucharist from being used in a Black Mass." (Wikipedia)

Video from Sept. 17, 2020.

"A statue of Our Lady of Guadalupe was vandalized at Shrine Church of Our Lady of Solace. Praying for the church, as parishioners come together to raise funds to repair the statue important to the whole #ConeyIsland community. @TabletNewspaper https://t.co/aBkhpnClbF." - — Diocese of Brooklyn (@BrooklynDiocese) September 16, 2020. (CBS New York).

Video from Sept. 15, 2020.

"EL PASO, Texas, September 17, 2020 (LifeSiteNews) – In yet another instance of vandalism directed at churches and religious symbols, a 30-year-old man on Tuesday toppled and destroyed a statue of the Sacred Heart of Jesus located on the high altar of the cathedral in El Paso, Texas.

"St. Patrick Cathedral, north of downtown, was vandalized on Sept. 16 at around 10 am, the diocese announced on Instagram. 'A suspect came into the sanctuary at St. Patrick Cathedral and destroyed the almost 90-year-old statue of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, which was located in the center behind the main altar of the church. The church was open and available for prayer.'" (LifeSite News)

Comment: These are only a few of the incidents which have been reported this month. A simple search will turn up hundreds of cases stretching back for years. Vandalism, arson, attacks on priests and in some cases mass shootings have been taking place in churches all around the world for some time now, and the Catholic church seems to be a prime target. I haven't been able to find any statistical evidence to support this conclusion, but my impression is that these attacks have been increasing dramatically for the last decade. Maybe that just reflects the fact that they're being reported more often -- I don't know -- but some sources believe that "these shocking events are undeniable proof that religious hostility is rising across America." (First Liberty) Whatever the case, these attacks are just another symptom of the ongoing collapse of the West.

Related: Desecration of Catholic Churches Across U.S. Leaves Congregations Shaken (WSJ, July 22, 2020).

Attacks on Catholic Statues Continues Over Weekend (CNA, July 20, 2020).

Churches Burned and Statues of Mary Vandalized in Churches Across U.S. (Rome Reports, July 13, 2020).

The Battle On The Ice 1242 AD (Updated)

Subject starts at app 0:40.

"The Battle on the Ice ... was fought between the Republic of Novgorod led by prince Alexander Nevsky and the forces of Livonian Order and Bishopric of Dorpat led by bishop Hermann of Dorpat on April 5, 1242, at Lake Peipus [see next video]. The battle is notable for having been fought largely on the frozen lake, and this gave the battle its name." Source: Wikipedia.

"The battle was a significant defeat sustained by the crusaders during the Northern Crusades, which were directed against pagans and Eastern Orthodox Christians rather than Muslims in the Holy Land. The Crusaders' defeat in the battle marked the end of their campaigns against the Orthodox Novgorod Republic and other Slavic territories for the next century."

It's easy to forget that the Crusades weren't just fought against Muslims in the so-called Holy Land, but also against pagans and other Christians in Europe. Technically, a crusade was any church-sanctioned campaign and military/religious orders, i.e., organized gangs, like the Teutonic Knights were used to forcibly convert or slaughter unbelievers and suppress rivals to Rome's hegemony. And these "holy warriors" went rogue sometimes, operating like bandits or mercenaries in the pursuit of their own interests when they weren't massacring Jews and Saracens or attacking Christian kingdoms.

This is how "orthodox" Christianity took over the West. The Eastern Orthodox Church managed to stand up to the onslaught, however. It is now the second largest Christian church in the world, due in large part to its military victories over Catholic forces:

"The legacy of the battle, and its decisiveness, came because it halted the eastward expansion of the Teutonic Order [1] and established a permanent border line through the Narva River and Lake Peipus dividing Eastern Orthodoxy from Western Catholicism. The knights' defeat at the hands of [Alexander Nevsky's] forces prevented the crusaders from retaking Pskov, the linchpin of their eastern crusade. The Novgorodians succeeded in defending Russian territory, and the crusaders never mounted another serious challenge eastward. Alexander was canonised as a saint in the Russian Orthodox Church in 1574." (Wikipedia)

[1] "Throughout the 13th and 14th century CE the Catholic Teutonic knights crusaded in Prussia and the Baltic area mainly against pagan Lithuanians and Orthodox Russians, but as the order was bent on expansion for its own sake, many other nationalities were fought besides those." (Ancient History Encyclopedia)

From the 1938 film Alexander Nevsky directed by Eisenstein. Music by Prokofiev. Full movie can be found here.

Despite the fact that he agreed to pay tribute to the Golden Horde, Alexander Nevsky is a legendary figure in Russia, a major national hero. Churches and cathedrals have been named after him. "On 24 September 2008, St. Alexander Nevsky was declared the main hero of Russia's history by popular vote ... In December 2008, he was voted the greatest Russian in the Name of Russia television poll." (Wikipedia)

"Hail and take heed, this is the tale one of the most famous Russian Heroes in history, second only to perhaps Vladimir of Kiev, the Baptizer of All Rus’. Few leaders have captured the hearts and minds of the Russians like Alexander Nevsky, who was voted Russia’s greatest leader of all time in 2008." Source: Russia Insider (2018).

The Catholic Holy Relic Racket (Updated)

The traffic in holy relics was one of the biggest scams perpetuated by the medieval Catholic church, ranking up there with the sale of indulgences. Relics were tourist attractions in the middle ages, just like they are today. Back in the medieval world, an insignificant local parish could become wealthy and famous by attracting pilgrims, so it's not very surprising that relics were in high demand. They could be almost anything -- the bones of a saint, a lock of a martyr's hair, the "Holy Prepuce,"  the fingernails of an early church father, a vial of sweat from the brow of Jesus, a scrap of wood from the True Cross, etc., etc. Most, if not all of them, were fake, of course, but the faithful never asked any questions.

Relics were sacred power objects. They were also infectious, i.e., the magical power in a relic could be very conveniently transferred to another object by contact, thus creating an almost infinite supply of relics which could then be set up in their own shrines.

"...relics aren't necessarily always body parts," according to Vice. "They come in three different flavors: First-class relics are body parts, second-class relics are pieces of clothing or things the saints touched while they were alive, and third-class relics are objects that other relics have touched. A relic has power no matter where it falls on this hierarchy, which is why you have so many lying around, and so many folks praying to them."

Body parts had the most talismanic power and were highly prized for their ability to extract money from pilgrims. For example, the bones of Saint Nicholas were thought to exude "a clear watery liquid which smells like rose water, called manna (or myrrh), which is believed by the faithful to possess miraculous powers," according to Wikipedia. The pilgrims who came to see these holy objects provided a major boost to local economies. Like modern tourists, they had to eat and sleep somewhere while they were in town. They would buy food, lodging and local products, not to mention the donations they made to the church.

Pilgrims still pay homage to the relics of St. Nicholas.

Abrahamic religions supposedly condemn idolatry, but if this isn't idolatry, I don't know what is. And there's no telling where these venerated objects came from originally. The conventional history of Nicholas's relics is a classic example of the way the relic traffic worked in the medieval world:

"Nicholas' tomb in Myra had become a popular place of pilgrimage. Because of the many wars and attacks in the region, some Christians were concerned that access to the tomb might become difficult. For both the religious and commercial advantages of a major pilgrimage site, the Italian cities of Venice and Bari vied to get the Nicholas relics. Taking advantage of the confusion, in the spring of 1087, sailors from Bari in Apulia seized part of the remains of the saint from his burial church in Myra, over the objections of the Greek Orthodox monks." (Wikipedia)

That's the story, anyway. There was no method for determining the authenticity of body parts in the middle ages, so the sailors could've just brought back some animal bones and passed them off as the bones of Saint Nicholas. Who would know the difference? And who knows if the original bones in Myra actually belonged to the saint? One way or another, the monks had good reason to complain about the theft of their valuable relics. Without them, they'd go out of business.

The Shroud of Turin, probably the most famous talismanic object associated with the Catholic church, is still a source of revenue. The church doesn't charge to view the shroud, but it attracts thousands of visitors every year and all kinds of shroud-related trip packages, hotel deals and walking tours are available at a price (1). And the controversy over the shroud's authenticity has spawned a minor publishing market for books arguing one side or another.

(1) Catholic pilgrimages, like Holy Land vacation deals, are a big business, and sometimes include an "audience with the Pope," assuming he isn't busy telling Europe to open its borders to unlimited immigration or trying to figure out how to deal with the church's latest pedophile scandal.

Next video shows Pope Francis praying in front of the Shroud of Turin back in 2015.

The belief in relics is still alive and well. In the case of the shroud, which is almost certainly a medieval forgery, many Christians are convinced that it actually shows the face of Christ despite the fact that no one knows what Jesus looked like (assuming that he ever actually existed). As for relics in general, a lot of people, especially in the third world, still believe that the remains of saints and various objects associated with church legends have some kind of supernatural power to heal disease and forgive sins.

In other words, a lot of Christians are devout fetishists.

Related:

Pilgrimage Routes and the Cult of the Relic

Hoaxes of the Middle Ages

Tuberculosis May Have Emerged In The Stone Age

The body of Bishop Peder Winstrup (1605-1679 AD). Video from 2015.

"When Anthropologist Caroline Arcini and her colleagues at the Swedish Natural Historical Museum discovered small calcifications in the extremely well preserved lungs of Bishop Peder Winstrup, they knew more investigation was needed. 'We suspected these were remnants of a past lung infection,' says Arcini, "and tuberculosis was at the top of our list of candidates. DNA analysis was the best way to prove it.'" Source: Science Daily.

The DNA analysis made it possible to compare a relatively modern strain of tuberculosis with a much older strain. The results suggest that tuberculosis emerged back in the Stone Age. According to one researcher, this is "the strongest evidence available to date for this emergence having been a Neolithic phenomenon."

Note: As described in the videos below and above (1:25), the bishop was interred with the remains of a baby:

"For almost 350 years Bishop Peder Winstrup lay quietly in his coffin in the crypt of the magnificent cathedral at Lund in Sweden, concealing a secret: the body of a tiny baby, tucked in under his feet." (The Guardian, 2015)

"The little corpse, believed to be of a baby born several months prematurely, was revealed for the first time when scientists scanned the coffin and the mummified body of Peder Winstrup, believed to be one of the best preserved 17th-century bodies in Europe."